Christmas Eve Cakes and Miracles
by blockedthewriter
Summary: Christmas Cake - Slang for an unmarried girl over 25. "Nobody wants Christmas cake after the 25th." Haruhi won't become one with Tamaki so obviously entranced with her, right?
1. Chapter One

**Kurisumasuke-ki/Gâteau de Noël **

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_start_

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The air was chill outside and Haruhi was happy to be inside a warm place, albeit cramped as it was. Families: sons and fathers, daughters and mothers—crying babies, all crushed themselves inside of the small diner and hungrily scarfed down chicken*1. It wasn't the most delightful scent, but it reminded Haruhi of the holidays and consequently of her mother, and she could feel a bittersweet smile forming on her face.

Someone coughed and she glanced up; it was Hikaru alerting her of his presence. He slid into the booth easily and laughed.

"Tamaki finally get you to dress more like a girl, huh?" He asked bluntly, brushing his dark hair to the side.

She shifted, crossing her legs almost self-consciously. Since she'd begun her first year of college her clothes had gradually become more feminine, and although still nothing like the frilly dresses that her Father and Tamaki had so often dreamed of, they still made her slightly uncomfortable—it was something she was not yet used to. At least today she wasn't wearing a skirt. Baby blue plaid pants adorned her legs and a white t-shirt with a paw print on it hung loosely over a sky-blue thermal. Her hair was still short, but she was wearing two white barrettes.

She shifted and toyed with the napkin on the table, feeling slightly nervous.

"So Haruhi, how have things been with Ta-ma-ki?" Hikaru asked in a singsong voice, fluttering his eyelashes a few times for dramatic effect. "Has he _finally_ made a move?" His tone was bored, almost exasperated. The brunette could feel her face flooding with warmth. She was still unsure of how to act in these types of social situations.

What should she tell him? How much information was _too_ much information? Hikaru had once harbored feelings for her, so wouldn't it be insensitive to talk about those sorts of things with him? (Not that there was much to talk about.) But then again, Hikaru _was_ asking, so perhaps it meant he was genuinely interested—but then again maybe he was just being polite?

"I'm not really sure what you mean. Things are the same for us." Haruhi decided to maintain neutral, hoping that she wouldn't be bombarded with any more questions.

"Well you better tell him to hurry up, or I might finally have to make _my_ move," a new voice suddenly interjected, filled with amusement.

"Ah, Kaoru! Oh, and Kyouya-senp—Kyouya-kun!" She stumbled over the suffix, the many years she'd spent with him in high school still ingrained in her mind.

"Haruhi," Kyouya nodded towards her in acknowledgement, "Hikaru."

Kaoru sat down beside Hikaru, and Kyouya followed.

"So, how have your holidays been, Haruhi? I'm sure there's some type of commoner-festival coming up any day now, correct?" Haruhi was glad for the simple conversation.

"Mine have been good so far. I'm going to spend New Year's with my Father, and of course I'm going to be giving gifts to everyone soon! They're just simple things, but I'm sure you'll all enjoy them."

"And what of Christmas Eve*2?" Kyouya wasn't usually one to prod. Haruhi glanced down.

"You don't want to become a Christmas Cake*3, you know!" Hikaru blurted, laughing heartily at his own joke.

"Hikaru!" Kaoru snapped, and without much time to become offended or embarrassed, Haruhi was instead filled with a sweet sense of nostalgia.

"Did someone say cake?" Haruhi knew who it was even though the voice behind the words was so changed. Instead of the squeaky, childish voice that had once enraptured gaggles of swooning school-girls, there was a much deeper, much more masculine voice, coming from a much taller, much more masculine person.

"Hi everybody! Hey, Haru-chan, did you miss me? I haven't seen you since school started! Hey, are you guys going to order cake?" Mori appeared behind the energetic—could Haruhi really refer to Hunny as a _man?—_still much taller despite Hunny's late growth spurt. Hunny was definitely taller than he once was—much more so than Haruhi—but still the shortest of the bunch. He made up for it with boundless enthusiasm.

"What kind of cake were you going to order?" Mori squeezed his large frame next to Kyouya, and Haruhi wondered briefly if they were deliberately not sitting next to her. Hunny opted for Mori's lap, and given the lack of space and his still much smaller frame, it seemed to work out quite nicely.

"Haru-chan, Haru-chan!" Hunny whined loudly, attracting the attention of several other patrons.

Hunny continued on, oblivious. "Hey! I got my ear pierced, you know!" Hunny tucked his hair behind his ear and leaned across the table to show her the small stud. "I thought it was gonna hurt, but then Takashi said he would do it first if it would make me feel better! Then he held my hand the whole time—and now we match!" Haruhi hadn't even noticed. She glanced at Mori's ear.

"Wow, that looks really good on you two." She smiled warmly. Being with the host club again was relaxing. Despite the staring customers and strange looks, Haruhi felt completely at home.

"Ah! Sorry for leaving you waiting Haruhi—I had to—" The blond stopped abruptly and observed everyone seated.

"Hi—To-Tamaki-kun." Kaoru had to stop himself from the once overused 'tono'. Old habits die hard sometimes. Tamaki stared.

"What's wrong with Tamaki?" Hunny whispered worriedly.

There was a sudden explosion of energy and tears that rivaled even Hunny's.

"_Ohhhh_—it's like the whole family's together again!" He flung himself dramatically across the table and encircled his arms around Kyouya, pulling him into an awkward but tight embrace. "Oh Mommy, I haven't seen you in forever!" Tamaki then proceeded to gush over each former-Host Club member individually, asking questions like when did you grow so tall, and did you miss me, did you miss me, and why don't you ever visit?

"Oh Mommy, you're so terrible! Abandoning me for classes and leaving me to raise our only daughter all alone!" He threw his hand over his forehead dramatically. Some things never changed.

"Tamaki, I'm not your daughter. I already have a father." Tamaki hadn't said things like this in quite some time, and Haruhi assumed it was merely a lapse into nostalgia due their current situation.

"Hey _tono_, don't you think it's a bit disturbing to still be calling Haruhi your daughter?" Hikaru asked, and the others nodded in agreement.

"That _is_ a bit incestuous." Kyouya muttered, smirking.

"Yeah, and incest isn't funny, even if it is only pretend." Kaoru said solemnly, resisting the urge to laugh.

"_Incest_?" Tamaki screeched indignantly. "But I—Haruhi?" He glanced towards her with pleading eyes. She shrugged.

"Ah—but—Kyouya? Hunny? _Mori_?" Tamaki swung his head in several directions frantically.

"Don't you think we're passed that now?" A low voice rumbled.

And maybe they should have been. Mori and Hunny had long moved on to a University with everyone else not far behind. It was strange without the Host Club, but Haruhi was slowly adjusting to her new life, her new apartment, her new—well—whatever Tamaki was supposed to be to her.

Tamaki shrugged into the booth beside her, squeezing everyone together and almost pushing Mori out of his seat completely. A few years ago he might have begun wailing and moping, but Hunny wasn't the only one who had done some growing up.

"So Haruhi, this is a real commoner diner! Everything is so tiny and cramped—and no one is dressed up at all!" Tamaki exclaimed excitedly, glancing around like a child in a candy store.

"Not to mention we've been here for practically ten minutes, and the waiter is yet to ask us for our drinks," Hikaru complained dryly.

"Hikaru!" Kaoru whispered, "Don't say insensitive things like that. Businesses like this probably can't afford to hire enough people so that everyone has their own waiter! You're going to offend Haruhi!"

Haruhi rolled her eyes. She supposed there were some things that the rest of them just couldn't quite understand.

"Do we get to wash our own dishes?" Tamaki asked, nearly bouncing in his seat, and for a moment Haruhi wasn't sure if he was patronizing her or not.

"Of course not. Here comes the waiter now, quiet down."

After several embarrassing attempts in which various former Host Club members attempted to order various expensive things that were obviously not on the menu, Haruhi shushed them all and ordered several "Christmas Chicken" specials.

Hunny jumped up and down suddenly.

"Hey, Tamaki, Tamaki! Did you see my ear? Mori and I had our ears pierced!" Tamaki stared in awe. Haruhi wondered briefly if Hunny repeated the story to everyone he came in contact with.

"That's so cool you guys! Did it hurt? When did this happen? Are you guys gonna get tattoos too?!" Tamaki was easily roped in, eyes glittering, imagining the two with cool haircuts and motorcycles to match.

"So you guys are official now, right?" Hikaru asked off-handedly. Hikaru often had a way with saying the most uncomfortable things as if he were asking for the time.

"Yes." Mori was speaking more than usual. Maybe it was because he hadn't seen everyone in such a long time.

"Official?" Tamaki tilted his head. He was more often than not the last to figure things out.

"Officially what?" Tamaki continued on, becoming increasingly excited.

"I can't believe he didn't notice." Kaoru whispered to his twin.

"Well we all know how long it took him to figure out Haruhi's gender." Kyouya commented.

"Not to mention the fact that he liked her," Hikaru continued.

"I mean, even you noticed before he did," Kaoru chuckled, speaking of his older twin.

"You guys—don't talk about me like I'm not here—I can hear you! What do you mean official? And it didn't take me that long to figure out that Haruhi was a girl! I knew she was cute right from the beginning!"

Haruhi felt her cheeks warm.

"Aw, you're making her blush." Hikaru laughed.

"Really—what are you guys, Hunny, Mori? What's going on!?"

"What Mori said but you were obviously too dense to catch on to, was that perhaps it is like you said those many years ago, and we are indeed the homo side characters." Kyouya laughed, and the sound of it sent chills down Haruhi's spine—and not of the good sort either.

"Ho..mo...side characters?" Tamaki repeated slowly, still obviously dumbfounded.

Exasperated and bothered, Hunny decided to explain once and for all. "It's like with Kaoru and Kyouya, or you and Haru-chan!" Tamaki's face remained blank.

"Ah—Tamaki! It's like this!" Then Hunny did the unthinkable, craned his neck upwards and kissed Mori; quick and innocent—but with such a sense of ease—like he'd been doing it for years. He probably had been. Haruhi glanced away just in time to catch Tamaki's face slowly filling with red.

"Idiot." Hikaru murmured. Haruhi couldn't tell to whom it was directed toward: Tamaki for being so dense or Hunny for the blatant show of affection in such a public area.

Tamaki sat with his mouth agape and eyes wide. "Bu-but-but—Mori! When I asked you if you ever thought about kissing Hunny you said no! And then—wait—_Kyouya_ and?—_Haruhi and I aren't like that!_" Tamaki shouted, slamming his hands down onto the table and standing. He was blushing furiously at the mere implication.

"I—I—I—uh, I have to go to the bathroom!" The French blond said in a rush, darting out of the booth and towards the back of the restaurant.

Several customers threw them dirty looks and grumbled about all the commotion. Haruhi swallowed thickly and idly twiddled her thumbs. She could feel five sets of eyes watching her every move.

"Haru-chan, I thought that you and Tamaki—" Hunny started.

"Mitsukuni."

"Haruhi, Tamaki can be rather slow at times." Kyouya added, but Haruhi couldn't meet his eyes.

"Not to mention emotionally-weird, like Kyouya," Kaoru continued, draping his arm around the dark-haired teen, "But in a different way." Kyouya attempted to hide his embarrassment by adjusting his glasses.

"So, Kaoru, are you and Kyouya living together now?" Haruhi asked suddenly, attempting to change the subject. Kaoru began talking excitedly, absent-mindedly toying with the ends of Kyouya's hair while said male pretended not to notice. The conversation went smoothly for a few minutes, the six of them exchanging various stories of their new lives—too many projects and simple worries and Haruhi getting a new job.

"And then I said—that's not my boyfriend—it's my _brother_!"

The table burst into uproarious laughter, and Haruhi laughed too, for a moment forgetting that Tamaki still hadn't reappeared at the table. But then Kyouya sat down his fork a little too loudly, and Haruhi knew it had been on purpose.

"I'm going to excuse myself for a moment Haruhi, perhaps I can convince Tamaki to return the table. I'm sure this isn't even necessary to say, but he can be very melodramatic at times." Kyouya headed towards the restrooms, and the table was draped in an eerie silence.

"Um, Haruhi—I know this is kinda personal, but how exactly are you and tono doing?" A tentative voice asked. Haruhi glanced up, it was Kaoru, of course.

"I'm not really sure myself. He seems to still think of me as his daughter." It was beginning to drive her crazy. They were living together! A peck on the forehead, a warm embrace, but then afterwards always a smile a laugh, and a, I can do that you know, because I'm your father!

Except he really _wasn't_ her father.

"I think tono is just shy!" Hunny offered; smile warm. Haruhi wanted to think so too—

"Maybe you should just be the boy again." Someone said—and no one was quite sure who had said it at first—until the they remembered that Mori was still there.

"The boy...?" Haruhi asked, confused. Didn't Tamaki _want_ her to be more like a girl? Wearing stupid skirts and barrettes, all so that Tamaki would think of her as something other than a daughter, and now Mori was saying to be a boy?

"Well tono is more like a girl than you are Haruhi," Hikaru shrugged.

"He means personality-wise!" Kaoru amended, throwing his older brother a bothered look.

Haruhi considered it, it was definitely a possibility, but then—if they were wrong—she'd feel so stupid.

"Maybe you should ask him if he wants to go out tomorrow night!" Hunny said excitedly. "Couples always go out on Christmas Eve!"

"But don't the boys usually ask girls that sort of thing?" Hikaru raised a brow.

"See that's what I mean! I think Tono is just so nervous and girly in his head that he doesn't—"

"Tamaki!" Hunny said quickly. They all turned their heads'. Standing next to Kyouya was an embarrassed looking violet-eyed man, appearing much more like a guilty child than a man at all.

"Tamaki." Kyouya said pointedly, staring at him.

"But—Mommy—it was only—" Kyouya gave him a sharp look.

"Oh Hunny! Mori! I hope you aren't mad at _meeeee_!" Tears seemed to appear simultaneously, waterfalls cascading to the floor.

"I don't think it's gross or anything like that I just was surprised and confused and I really didn't mean any harm! Please don't hate me now!" Before Tamaki could apologize any further, a waiter appeared by their table.

"I apologize, but I'm going to have to ask you all to leave the premises. We've had several complaints."

:::

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_skip_

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The next day was difficult for Tamaki, emotions running rampant and confusion nearly dripping from his ears. If Mori had lied that day back in Ouran—that he really _did_ think of kissing Hunny—and now Hunny and Mori were like _that, _then did it mean that he and Haru—that he and Haruhi were like _that_ too?

But wasn't wanting to kiss your daughter and show affection for her normal? Every father loved his daughter!

"It's natural to want to kiss and hug them and be around them all the time!" Tamaki exclaimed suddenly, sounds reverberating off of white walls in an empty apartment. He attempted to convince them further.

"I'm sure my Father always missed me and he always gave me hugs and kissed me on the forehead, honest!" He could nearly feel the walls roll their eyes.

"Honest," he muttered weakly.

But the more Tamaki thought about the situation—and he thought about it _all _day—the more worried he became.

He pondered on it as he did the dishes. It wasn't so normal to think of your daughter _constantly_, was it? He placed a dish in the dishwasher with a loud clatter. Shouldn't a father think of other things as well? He didn't think of Mommy nearly half as much. He sighed and turned off the water. Nothing could distract him.

He paced throughout their home chewing on his bottom lip and wondering just what he was going to do when Haruhi returned. It wasn't as though he could just go to the other side of the house like he could with his grandmother back at his own home—because despite his great insistence that he could buy them something much larger and fancier—Haruhi had settled on a meager two bedroom apartment. In her eyes, struggling to pay a monthly bill and scrounge up her last cents to go grocery shopping—it was part of being a young adult—a part she did not want to miss out on.

Tamaki wasn't completely unused to the newfound lack of luxury, however, because one couldn't hang around Haruhi for so long without coming to understand that commoners literally survived on what appeared to be the bare minimum.

After pacing around the small living room a few more times, he decided to spend some time with the calendar, crossing off the days that had passed so far. He had little else to do without Haruhi around to berate him or tell him to do this chore or that.

He mumbled to himself as he drew a thick black line through each day with a a black marker. _Twenty-first, twenty-second, twenty-third_—

"_Confession!?_" He screeched suddenly. Directly under the small 24, written in neat, black letters, was a single word, 'confession.' Had Haruhi done something wrong, and now she was going to turn herself into the authorities? Or was it _that_ sort of a confession?

Tamaki wasn't sure which option was worse. He swallowed thickly.

And the twenty-fourth, wasn't that—why, that was Christmas Eve! It _was_ that sort of confession. His little Haruhi was going to confess her feelings to someone? To _whom_? Tamaki began pacing the kitchen, wracking his brain. Haruhi had not mention anyone as of late. Was it a secret? Someone he would not approve of?

What if it was some older man that she'd met at the University? Probably some liberal or radical with crazy ideals or a foreigner who didn't shave and wanted to whisk Haruhi away to America with promises of fancy tuna and foreign food!

How could—someone whisking her away? _Never!_ Not that he was jealous or anything like that, he was merely worried for the well-being of his daughter.

He didn't harbor any less than platonic feelings nor the need to do any confessing of his own to anyone.

"These are purely paternal thoughts!" He yelled. Besides, this could be anyone that Haruhi was going to confess to tomorrow! What if it was a teacher who had seduced his innocent daughter? Promises to boost her grade and, Haruhi really did care about her grades an awful lot—and she had been doing better in science lately, but-but-_but_—

Haruhi would never stoop so low!

But what if she'd been cornered? What if she had no choice and was being taken advantage of and was too afraid and scared and small to ask for help because he was threatening her friends or the only family she had left?!

His eyes bulged as he stared at the tiny print. But then again, it did say _confession_, and those sorts of things usually tended to mean that it voluntary.

It hardly settled his stomach. Haruhi had no idea what was best for her! This man probably lied to Haruhi and now she had the wrong idea about him—that he was nice and sweet—but really he was some filthy scoundrel—probably involved with the Yakuza or some other vagabonds—and any minute he was going to pull up outside in his motorcycle with a bunch of tattoos and—

"No daughter of mine is getting involved with the Yakuza!" He exclaimed suddenly.

"Who's getting involved with the Yakuza?" A voice asked suddenly, and Tamaki screeched in terror, flinging himself across the room and tripping over his own legs before flailing silently and falling behind the couch.

"Please don't!" He cowered, covering his face. "I can pay you off!"

"Tamaki?" A violet eye cracked open slowly.

"Haruhi?" He asked, unsure.

"Who else would just be waltzing into our apartment?" She arched an eyebrow and shook her head.

"I'm so glad you're safe!" Tamaki was on his feet in an instant, wrapping his arms around Haruhi dramatically and pulling her against him, her face pressed against his white button-up shirt,

She blushed. "Of c-course I'm safe. What's wrong with you?" She asked, words muffled against his chest.

"I just worry for you! Getting involved with foreigners and Yakuza, and you know—I heard America has it's _own_ sort of Yakuza, except they call them the—"

Haruhi stepped back from him, pushing his arms away. She gave him a long, hard look. "Are you sure you're not sick?"

"No of course not, I'm in perfectly normal and healthy condition!"

"But, Tamaki, why would I be involved with Yakuza—or foreigners, for that matter?" His face turned crimson. He couldn't tell her that he'd seen what was written on the calendar. It was probably something very personal that she wasn't ready to speak about and that's why she hadn't yet told him herself. She might even consider it an invasion of privacy. But then—what if this man really was some sort of troublemaker?

"Well, you know, I know that you're at that age where you might be becoming interested in-ah-romance, and well, I just wanted you to know..." Haruhi could feel her heart rate speeding up. Was he finally going to say something? That he thought of her as more then a daugh—friend?

"That um-whoever you choose, I'd just like to meet them first, because really, I could get Kyouya to do a background check, because you really never know what sort of illegal activities these sort of men could be involved in. It's my duty as your father to make sure that this man isn't any trouble!" There. He had been vague enough to get his worries across, without completely embarrassing her by revealing that he knew her secret—that she was going to confess soon.

Haruhi held a strange expression. "Oh, uh, yeah. Of course." Haruhi looked almost hurt, and as she headed towards her bedroom he felt distinctly guilty, as though he had really done something wrong. He wasn't being too overprotective was he? Did she realize he'd seen what was written on the calendar? But she really had written it in a rather public area of the house.

He couldn't figure it out, but he felt awful anyway, chewing on his bottom lip. He really didn't want _any_ man dating his daughter, Yakuza, foreigner, or, or, _anyone_.

But wasn't that unfair? To want to keep Haruhi all to himself? To want to see her everyday and make her a bento before she leaves for classes and watch her sleep at night, and to maybe even one day help her take of the children.

_Children?!_ His _grand_children, of course! Not children like he and Haruhi would be having children together because he definitely didn't wonder whether or not they'd get he big brown eyes or his blond hair or about kissing Haruhi before she would leave for work or about anyof that sort of stuff—

"I'm sick, aren't I?" He wondered out loud, flopping himself face-down onto the carpet. He stared at the phone just a little ways off, and figured it was high-time he gave someone a call. Someone who was already and expert in the field of impure thoughts and incestuous feelings, and yet someone who wouldn't ridicule him.

_Kaoru_.

:::

_skip_

:::

_Dammit._ Of all the times for Hikaru to ignore his cellphone, why now? After a few hours of puttering around the house and very, very awkward dinner between him and Haruhi he'd finally decided that enough was enough. It was obviously affecting his relationship with Haruhi—so something needed to be done.

And of course Kaoru wasn't answering his phone!

This time it was actually important. Thinking of Haruhi in that sort of manner, with pretty brown eyes, and that lovely smile, and the way her breasts were so small and cute and perky...

He scrambled to redial the numbers.

_Ring_, pause, _ring_, pause, _ring_, pause, _ring_, pause—maybe!—Hi, this is Kaoru, I'm not available to speak right now—_Hikaru, shut up—_but you can leave a message—_he won't call you back!—Hikaru!_—**beep.**

He glanced at the clock. It _was_ nearing eleven in the evening. Perhaps Kaoru had already gone to bed for the night? But then, Kaoru had always been a night person, and it wasn't as if he was some sort of old man, _honestly_—

He dialed again. _Please answer, please answer, please answer, __**please**_—

"Hello." A calm voice answered.

"Hello?" Tamaki echoed nervously. Why was Kyouya answering the phone? Had he dialed the wrong number? He glanced down at the numbers displayed on the screen. Then it clicked.

"Oh—_oh!_ Hi, Kyouya! Um, is Kaoru available? He's not busy is he?" Tamaki had never been one for chants or gods, but as of current he was doing the former and praying to the latter.

"No, no, he's not too busy. And this sounds important, after all. Hold on a second." There was brief shuffling and muffled speaking. Tamaki wondered what they were saying. Calling him trouble for calling so late and—

"Ahahaha...Hello! _Tamaki_!" a strained voice answered, and the blond found himself caught quite off guard. Why did Kaoru sound so uncomfortable? Had Kyouya woken him up for this? Was he going to be angry?

It didn't matter. There was no time for such thoughts. He could be jeopardizing his relationship with his only daughter! He wasted no time.

"Okay, so I was thinking about Mori and Hunny and how one time back in Ouran I asked Mori if he thought about kissing Hunny and he said no, but then I realized that I was a father so it was okay, but now that I know that Mori _did_ think about kissing Hunny and now that Mori and Hunny are like _that_, I mean, I was thinking that it would make me and Haruhi like _that_! And then I was thinking some more and I started—I just, I started thinking some, some—," He swallowed. It was now or never.

"Some less than platonic things about her!" The blond said in a rush.

Tamaki felt lighter and heavier all at once. While he had finally said it out loud, told someone, gotten it off his chest, on the same note it made it all that much more real. Silence greeted him. Was Kaoru disgusted? But—

"Well I thought I'd call you because I know that you and Hikaru—"

"That's hardly the same!"

Anger erupted on the other side of the line. Well of course he knew that stuff was only for show, but he was never one-hundred percent sure.

"Well I thought it was close enough." He said with a shrug. Then there was the whole sleeping in the same bed thing. Tamaki opted not to say the last bit. Kaoru sounded angry enough as it was. He seemed to be running on a short fuse for some reason.

"What do I _want_? I don't know! Can't you just tell me what to do or give me some advice? I mean, one minute Haruhi is my young, innocent daughter, and the next minute—are you okay?!" There was a sudden shout on the other end of the line. What the hell was Kaoru doing?

"No, no—I just, uh—I stubbed my toe, really it's fine. Keep going." His reassurance sounded weak. When had Kaoru become so clumsy?

"And so, yeah, so the next, minute, I just to have—_well_—impure thoughts about her! I mean, I know I'm not related to her by blood, but a father's bond needs no such thing! Isn't it just all so wrong?"

"No, I don't think it's wrong. It's not as though Haruhi is actually—"

There was a sharp intake of breath on the other end of the phone. Kaoru did think it was wrong, didn't he? All the stuff between him and his brother, it really just was for show, and it wasn't as if—

"Oh no, I'm here! Sorry." He coughed. And it sounded suspiciously fake.

"Are you even listening?!" Tamaki exploded. Here he was, pouring his heart out and asking for advice on a very, _very_ serious subject, and Kaoru was running around stubbing his toes and coughing and barely listening?

"Oh no! I'm listening. I think that you're just pr-probably," Kaoru's next words were a string of stuttering followed by a low hissing noise, "d-developing romantic f-f-feelings for her..."

Was he taming snakes over there—_romantic feelings? !_

"_Kaoru!_" The blond screeched. _Romantic feelings?_ He thought about all the urges he'd had to protect Haruhi. Merely paternal, right? _Right?_

"No, I'm fine. I'm just—" fine? Tamaki hadn't asked him if he was fine or not. His face scrunched up in confusion. Was Kaoru playing an online game while talking on the phone with him again?

"I'm putting alcohol on my toe—you know, I stubbed it earlier—and it really burns so..."

Oh, so that had been sarcasm. Tamaki felt guilty. It wasn't nice to ignore your friend's pain just because you were going through something.

"Oh, I'm sorry Kaoru! Are you okay? Do you need stitches?! I can probably drive you to a hospital!" What if Kaoru lost one of his toes and it would be all his fault because he was so selfish he hadn't even bothered to ask his friend how his toe was doing?

Kaoru reassured him otherwise.

Tamaki retreated into his own thoughts again. Speaking out loud—although largely for his own benefit.

"You don't think...that, well maybe it's been this way this whole time, do you?" Tamaki murmured. How could he have been so confused? What did Haruhi think? Had she known? For how long? Always? Was she disgusted?

"Do you think, that, that maybe I should tell her?" That was a terrifying thought. No time for such impractical things, that's probably what she'd say.

There was a long silence in which Kaoru didn't respond.

"_Hello?_ Kaoru?" Tamaki finally asked, irritation rising.

"Yeah, I'm here. D-definitely. I think you sh-should. It's perfectly normal. I'm sure—yes, okay, well—"

"But you know—what if she doesn't like me—or even worse, she thinks I'm disgusting. You know she probably does think of me as her father, and after all this time I just..."

"I-I..." Kaoru started, voice wavering. Did he know something about Haruhi? About her feelings? Kaoru and Haruhi always had gotten along fairly well. Perhaps she'd confided something in him, but Kaoru was struggling over his loyalty as a friend and over his want not to—

"Y-you, have to figure the rest out yourself! It's a-a-a growing experience! I-I think you were right—"

Right about what...?

"I'm sorry, I think I do have to go the hos-_s_-pital after all. Gottagobye!"

_Click._

Tamaki was suddenly struck with two very distinctly different urges: to run and tell Haruhi that Kaoru was in trouble and call an ambulance to his house, and to run and tell Haruhi that, I think you're right and you don't need two fathers—so can I please, please, be your boyfriend instead?

:::

_to be continued._

:::

*In recent years, thanks to the marketing prowess of the folks at Kentucky Fried Chicken, the Christmas Chicken Dinner has become quite popular.

*Christmas Eve has been hyped by the T.V. media as being a time for romantic miracles. It is seen as a time to be spent with one's boyfriend or girlfriend in a romantic setting, so fancy restaurants and hotels are often booked solid at this time. It is often also a time when girls get to reveal their affections to boys and vice versa. Because of this, extending a girl an invitation to be together on Christmas Eve has very deep, romantic implications.

*The Japanese celebrate Christmas Eve by eating a 'Christmas Cake' which the father of the family purchases on his way home from work (or his wife does in the case where he has to work on Christmas Eve). Stores all over carry versions of this Christmas cake and drop the price of it drastically on December 25th in order to sell everything out by the 26th. This has resulted in a rather interesting expression in which young girls are referred to as a 'Christmas cakes': marriageable until their 25th birthday and requiring heavy discounts to get married after their 25th birthdays.

1In recent years, thanks to the marketing prowess of the folks at Kentucky Fried Chicken, the Christmas Chicken Dinner has become quite popular.

2Christmas Eve has been hyped by the T.V. media as being a time for romantic miracles. It is seen as a time to be spent with one's boyfriend or girlfriend in a romantic setting, so fancy restaurants and hotels are often booked solid at this time. It is often also a time when girls get to reveal their affections to boys and vice versa. Because of this, extending a girl an invitation to be together on Christmas Eve has very deep, romantic implications.

3The Japanese celebrate Christmas Eve by eating a 'Christmas Cake' which the father of the family purchases on his way home from work (or his wife does in the case where he has to work on Christmas Eve). Stores all over carry versions of this Christmas cake and drop the price of it drastically on December 25th in order to sell everything out by the 26th. This has resulted in a rather interesting expression in which young girls are referred to as a 'Christmas cakes': marriageable until their 25th birthday and requiring heavy discounts to get married after their 25th birthdays.


	2. Chapter One Point Five

This is the phone conversation between Tamaki and Kaoru from the last chapter, but from Kaoru's point-of-view.

**Kurisumasuke-ki/Gâteau de Noël **

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_extra/start_

:::

"Kyou-_ya_." Kaoru said breathlessly, wrapping his fingers around thick hardness and pulling. The man beneath him jerked his hips upwards, colliding their groins together and making the other gasp.

"...Yes?" Kyouya managed, pushing his glasses into place, eyes darker than usual. "What do you need?" Kaoru groaned in frustration. Kyouya had a way with teasing and patience that drove Kaoru wild. As well as a tendency to answer rhetorical questions. If Kaoru didn't know better, Kyouya's words more often than not veered rather close to dirty talk.

Slender fingers closed loosely around Kaoru's cock, and he found himself unable to answer, lost in fluttery sensations and almost-not-quite-enough friction.

"What was it that you wanted, Kaoru-chan?" Kyouya asked in a teasing voice. "You did say my name." Kyouya reminded him, speeding up the pace.

"Don't be so..." His words trailed away into frantic movement and heavy breathing. He could feel the slow build beginning; the adrenaline coursing through his veins and a slow, pulsating heat. He'd hoped they'd actually have sex tonight, but with Kaoru finding himself so close so soon, he doubted it.

But he wasn't really complaining, because, dammit, he was _so_ close.

"Ky-Kyouy_a_." He was saying again, the last syllable all dragged out and drippy like maple syrup. Kyouya jerked his hips forward. Kaoru was nearly certain that Kyouya got off on hearing his name. Got off on the control, maybe. A true shadow king. The dark haired man began to shift, bringing his knee up.

"My wrist hurts." Kyouya said plainly. Kaoru moved forward and made and unhappy noise.

"Don't act like some sort of puppy. Here, just move forward a bit—"

"Ugh. Wouldn't it just be better it we switched places?" Kaoru asked grumpily, every bump and slide of cloth across his cock sending chills down his spine.

"I don't feel like holding myself up." Kyouya said simply. The lazy bastard. With a little more shuffling and few, no, I-refuse-to-stay-in-this-position's, they were finally comfortable. Or at any rate, at least Kyouya was.

The dark-eyed male was still beneath him on the mattress, except now Kaoru was leaning forward with only the front of his body, so that his ass was in the air, therefor giving ample space for Kyouya to reach beneath him and grab hold of his cock. He wrapped his fingers around it roughly.

"How would you like it?" Kyouya drawled slowly. And just as Kaoru was about to kindly tell him to shut the hell up and move his hand, a loud noise interrupted the room.

"Is that your cell phone?" Kyouya asked warily.

"I'm sorry, just ignore it!" Kaoru hadn't wasted twenty minutes of convincing Kyouya that sex was much better than sleep just for it to be ruined.

"It's very distracting, I don't think I can concentrate." Kyouya had a real fine way of being a bastard at the best of times.

With an exaggerated sigh and groan Kaoru threw himself off of the bed and began rummaging through his bag, searching, _searching_, found it. He stared at the caller id. _It was tono, of course. _He ended the call and clamored back on top of Kyouya, cell phone still in hand. He sat it on the table beside them. Kyouya looked at him expectantly.

"It was just tono."

"Of course. Who else would call at this hour?" Kaoru didn't bother to mention that it was hardly eleven o'clock on a Friday.

"C'mon, let's just forget about tono and—" _have him call _again, _of course. _The loud generic ringtone sent buzzing sound waves throughout the bedroom, and Kaoru cringed. Kyouya wasn't going to deal with these sorts of interruptions much longer.

"I'm really sorry, here, I'll turn it off—"

But this time Kyouya paid it no heed—apparently not such a distraction—instead rolling the two over—all that careful positioning shot the hell—and began to fondle him teasingly. The irritating sound of the cellphone faded away until the red-head could hear it no longer. The only sounds reaching him were his own heartbeat and slight shift of the bed sheets, and then, of course, Kyouya's conversation beside his ear.

Conversation?

"No, no, he's not too busy. And this is important after all. Hold on a second." Kyouya stared at him darkly; smirked.

"The phone is for you, Kaoru. It's Tamaki-kun." Dark eyes glittered.

"Ahahaha...Hello! _Tamaki_!" He answered, nervous at Kyouya's sudden disturbing facial expression.

He sighed as Tamaki explained his situation. It would be something to do with Haruhi, but why must he call Kaoru, of all people? Wouldn't someone closer to tono, someone like, say, _Kyouya_, be a better option?

"What the hell is that supposed to mean? You know that stuff was just for show!" Kaoru exclaimed suddenly, voice angry. Was Tamaki really _that_ stupid? He didn't honestly believe that...

"How is that _close enough_? Look, just tell me what you want, I'm kinda in the middle of something right—" The rest of his words were drowned out in a surprised, _ahh_! as Kyouya began to stroke Kaoru through the white cloth of cotton sheets, easily bringing little Kaoru back to life. The red-head pushed away the intrusive hand, throwing the other a scandalized expression.

"No, no—I just, uh—I stubbed my toe, really it's fine. Keep going." He attempted to keep his voice neutral. What was with Kyouya today? Did he think this was funny? Tamaki continued to go on about Haruhi, and about he worried he was beginning to have impure thoughts about his only daughter. Kaoru allowed him to blather on, awaiting Tamaki to have his epiphany.

"No, I don't think it's wrong. It's not as though Haruhi is actually—" He inhaled sharply as Kyouya sat up and began gyrating his hips, slowly grinding his ass against his erection, just a thin sheet between them.

Kaoru found himself clenching at the sheets. He silently mouthed the words _stop it_ to Kyouya, but he either didn't read lips or was ignoring him.

"Oh no, I'm here! Sorry," Kaoru attempted a lame cough to cover up up a choked groan. Kyouya's movement was just so perfect and—

"Oh no! I'm listening. I think that you're just pr-probably," Kyouya smirked, flicking at his nipples, "d-developing romantic f-f-feelings for her..." he made a low hissing noise as the dark-haired man wrapped his lips around one.

"No, I'm fine. I'm just—ah—" what possible excuse could he have for the obscene noises he was making? Had this been any other person they surely would have caught on by now. "I'm putting alcohol on my toe—you know, I stubbed it earlier—and it really burns so...no, I'm okay. I don't need stitches, it's just bleeding, and, yeah, I know right! Just f-from stubbing my toe... Well the end of this one chair we have _isss_ really pointy, and—"

He was blathering on and he knew it, but sentences weren't forming correctly in Kaoru's brain with Kyouya grinding against his cock like that.

But then, ah—thank god—Tamaki finally had it.

"Yeah, I'm here. D-definitely. I think you sh-should. It's perfectly normal. I'm sure—yes, okay, well—" But then there was Tamaki with his own anxiety again. What if Haruhi didn't like him back and some other nonsense.

"I-I..." Kyouya had shimmied down so that his mouth was breathing so, _so_ close to his cock. Kaoru glanced down and Kyouya's lips stretched into the most lurid, deceitful smile he had ever seen. Suddenly there was wetness around his cock—a sheet between them—but _jesus_, Kyouya's lips were against his cock. His swallowed heavily, and then in a rush, choked out:

"Y-you, have to figure the rest out yourself! It's a-a-a growing experience! I-I think you were right—" Kyouya's lips were nearly around it.

"I'msorry, I think I do have to go the hos-s-pital. Gottagobye!"

:::

_extra/end_

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	3. Chapter Two

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**Christmas Eve Cakes and Miracles**

::::

Tamaki slammed the phone down with a little more force than necessary. While at first he had been absolutely delighted with his new revelation—that he really did like Haruhi, and that he really wasn't her father, so it was okay—he was now in a state of immense depression and anxiety. At first he hadn't given it much thought: the fact that maybe Haruhi wouldn't return his feelings, that is. Sure, it'd crossed his mind, but he'd still hoped for the best and planned on baring his soul.

That's when he remembered the tiny print he'd read on the calendar just earlier that very day: _confession. _

Haruhi would definitely reject him—because she obviously already had someone else in mind. The man she was going to confess to was probably much better than him anyhow. He was probably a commoner, like Haruhi, and therefor he would already understand all of her customs and strange ways of life. He'd probably never asked questions like how do you open the dishwasher, or how do you change a light bulb. He probably knew how to vacuum and he'd probably been making instant coffee since before Tamaki was born.

The two of them probably discussed how fancy tuna was the best thing in the whole world, and how much they hated selfish, rich bastards. He probably had muscles too—Haruhi probably liked that—not like Tamaki at all, all lean and thin and impractically scrawny.

What did Haruhi like in boys, anyway?

Violet eyes shifted, studying the picture frame on his bedside table. It was a picture that had been taken on the last day of school, one of the entire Host Club. Even Renge was there. Everyone was smiling and looking happy, and surprisingly, Haruhi was dressed in Ouran's female uniform.

She'd decided to wear it on the on the last day of school, to finally reveal the truth—the shock and surprise had been monumental—with Renge's reaction being particularly extreme. Some of the girls had seemed rather embarrassed at having ever thought that Haruhi was handsome, but otherwise the day had gone surprisingly smoothly. While at first Renge seemed angry about the whole ordeal, it didn't take more than a few hours for her to quickly confess that she still liked Haruhi anyway, boobs and all. No one had really been all that surprised about the revelation, either.

Suddenly an alarm went of in Tamaki's head.

"It is a boy that she's going to confess to...right?" He swallowed. Was his Haruhi also like_ that_? Like Kaoru and Kyouya and Hunny and Mori? How? How could so many of them all lean in that direction? It was beginning to seem more and more like perhaps he and Hikaru were merely the heterosexual side characters, instead of the other way around!

"It-it can't be!" Tamaki shouted, panic overtaking his brain. For how long had Haruhi been this way? Why hadn't she ever told him? Was she afraid, did she think he was too judgmental?

What if it had been something she'd really been struggling with, and this entire time Tamaki hadn't even been given the chance to be there for her! What if she'd never given him the chance because she was creeped out because she could tell that he felt romantically about her! She couldn't tell, could she? Could everyone tell? For how long had everyone known?

Why was he always the last one to know?

Suddenly, he was struck with the very best idea. He would just go ahead and find out, right?

Mind reeling, he jumped up and scrambled for the necessary. A few minutes and a notepad later and Tamaki had mapped out his entire plan. It consisted of a series of questions, goals, and demonstrations, all of which, in the end, would tell him whether or not it was a boy or a girl that Haruhi was going to confess to. He intelligently dubbed it: Operation Find Out Haruhi's Sexuality.

He wasn't sure exactly why it was so important that he find out the gender of the person Haruhi he liked, but for some inexplicable reason, it really was. The idea that Haruhi liked a girl was really gnawing at his insides. If it was a boy Haruhi he liked—if Haruhi at least like boys—then he had somewhat of a chance, as small as it may be. With a girl, well—Tamaki couldn't turn himself into a girl!

Well, technically, he could, but that was something he really didn't want to spend too much time thinking about. At all.

With a deep breath Tamaki instantly had changed the subject. He tried instead to focus on the problem at hand. He liked to think of it as an investigation of sorts, with himself as the lead star; the very handsome and charismatic detective. As a detective, he knew that the best way to find information about a crime scene was to get in touch with the witnesses.

So, first things first.

The very first person he decided to call was Hikaru, for several reasons, however the most important reason simply being that Hikaru and Haruhi seemed to have formed a strange, rather close quasi-friendship over the years. Not to mention Hikaru didn't have any classes at the moment. He phoned him with excited fingers.

He began talking before Hikaru could even manage a mellow "_Moshi, moshi._"

"Hikaru, do you know anything about Haruhi involving a..." his thumbs twitched. How could he word this without giving everything about the situation away? "Confession?" he finally managed. There was a cough on the other line. A very suspicious cough. Hikaru definitely knew something.

"Uh, no-not particularly..." More coughing. Even _more_ suspicious. "Why do you ask? Maybe you'd be better off asking Kaoru anyway, he's much better at—"

Tamaki knew exactly what Hikaru was trying to do. He was attempting to defend Haruhi's honor, and keep his loyalty to her as a friend! While they were both very respectable traits—especially for someone like Hikaru—they really weren't going to help Tamaki at all. For the first time ever, he wished that Hikaru wasn't such a good guy. Why couldn't Haruhi have normal, secret-spilling, backstabbing friends? Weren't those the sort of friends girls were supposed to have anyway?

Unless it was different with Haruhi since Haruhi didn't want girls as just friends, she wanted to _date_ girls—confess to girls! He began to tap his foot anxiously. Haruhi did have a lot of male friends, didn't she? And all those years at Ouran, coming to school everyday dressed as a boy; it had obviously done something to her fragile psyche. Or perhaps she'd always identified as a boy, right from the very beginning! Maybe that was why she'd gotten a haircut in the first place, and the whole bubblegum-in-hair story was merely a cover up!

Tamaki chewed on his lip.

The only female friend Haruhi really had ever had was Renge, and everyone knew how Renge was with Haruhi! All those years of Haruhi pretending to be a boy, flirting and chatting with girls all the while she was a girl! Why had he let such a thing go on?

Now he was paying for it. Now Haruhi didn't like boys at all! What if it was his fault? Could something like that even be someone else's fault? Tamaki wasn't exactly sure quite how things liked that worked. He didn't know what made a person lean in one direction or the other. Maybe it was pre-determined. Maybe it wasn't.

But with Haruhi he didn't know one way or the other! He just_ didn't _know!

"Please, Hikaru! It'll just be between you and me, I promise! I really have to know! I can't have my daughter running of with any old crime-filled loser!" His cool detective demeanor was quickly crumpling, revealing the same old Tamaki, hysterical and afraid.

"It isn't a girl is it? Is Haruhi like Kyouya and Hunny? Is she?" The blond sobbed openly into the phone, and Hikaru resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Surely Hikaru would understand, right? He was like Tamaki was, not like Kyouya and those guys. He had to understand how it was.

"Look Hikaru, me and you, we're the same! We can see eye-to-eye! I just need to know—" click. Hikaru had hung up. Just like that.

Most of the conversations with the other former-host club members fared about just the same, ending with silence on the other line and Tamaki in tears. No one, not even _Kyouya_, seemed to have a scrap of useful information regarding Haruhi and whether or not she liked girls or boys. If anything, they seemed to be hiding something. Perhaps something far worse and even more sinister than he'd originally imagined. Haruhi wasn't really involved with the Yakuza, was she? She wasn't that tight on cash, right?

_Right?_

If things continued at this rate, Christmas Eve was going to arrive before Tamaki found out anything—and then it would be too late. Haruhi would confess and the person—boy, girl, whatever—would obviously return her feelings. They had too. How could anyone _not_ like Haruhi?

Resisting the urge to bawl and lapse into hysterics yet again, Tamaki forced himself to think clearly. Or at least attempt to. He tried mentally listing all the possible ways to gather information about someone, and then, out of nowhere, he found it—the perfect idea.

The Frenchman admonished that perhaps he'd been wrong, and that the_ real _best way to gather factual information had been apparent all along: gossip. With a renewed burst of energy, he scrambled into the bathroom to shower and then change. Immediacy aside, one should always look their best. Nearly tripping over his fit on his way out the door, he grabbed his bag and bolted down the street.

The parking lot was bigger than he'd expected. Tamaki had been to Haruhi's University once before, but he'd never really looked at the finer details: the architecture or the colors, and hardly the size of the parking lot. The building structure itself was impressive. High cement walls and rows and rows of tiny rectangular windows; little decorative carvings ingrained around the perimeter of the doorways. It was rather, beautiful, Tamaki thought.

Despite the school's beauty, things weren't going so well. He'd been standing outside of the main entry way for six and a half hours, and still, not a soul seemed to have any useful information about a Haruhi Fujioka. No one.

"Excuse me, fair lady, but I was wondering—" The fair lady in question was an average looking college student with long, black hair tied into a high pony tail. She gave him a hardly-concealed suspicious look.

"Shove off, creep, or I'm going to report you to the school security," She said, the disdain in her voice apparent. She turned heel, her scarf fluttering in the heavy, chill air as she walked away.

That was another problem. Even worse than the lack of information was the fact that most of students wouldn't even speak to him kindly. After just a few words they always looked at him as though he had buttoned up his shirt incorrectly. Perhaps commoners were merely suspicious of everyone?

"Excuse me, sir, but I wanted to know if—" The words had barely fallen from his lips when his eyes widened.

"Tamaki, why are you outside of my school?" a low voice asked flatly.

"H-Haruhi! You, ah, you're not wearing—I mean, you're, uh—you're dressed unusually today!" Tamaki had been pleased with Haruhi's recent interest in barrettes and cute clothing, but this, _this_ was like Ouran all over again! She was wearing a vest over a long-sleeved shirt, and plain, black pants. He'd thought she was a boy!_ Again_.

Haruhi refused to comment. "Why are you outside of my school? I told you I wouldn't be home until five today. I had English." English? Haruhi really did like foreigners, didn't she?

"I was merely checking up on my daughter! Can't a father worry about her daughter? Is that such a crime?" The violet-eyed man swallowed.

"Well it very well may be. It looks like you're trespassing, you're going to get yourself into trouble, you know."

Blond hair fell toward the pavement as Tamaki's head drooped. The whole investigation was going terribly. He'd wasted hours of life trying to find even the smallest scrap, the tiniest detail, and instead he'd found out nothing at all. Nothing. Even worse, time was not waiting for him. Christmas Eve was quickly approaching, and if he didn't find what was going on by tomorrow, all hope would be lost.

He glanced at the sky, briefly captured into how white it was today, in how wispy and broken apart the clouds looked. It was chill outside, and it had Tamaki shivering a bit, even through his heavy blue overcoat and long-sleeved white turtleneck. Most of the leaves had fallen from the trees, and he was beginning to feel like Mother Nature was mocking him, reminding him in every way possible that it was mid-December, and that soon, very soon, Christmas Eve would be here.

The thought crossed his mind that he ought to wear thicker pants, as well as the fact that he'd yet to buy anyone anything. Theoretically, Haruhi should have been the easiest Host Club member to buy for—she had so little—but in fact, she was the most difficult. While it was true that the the other host club members had nearly everything they wanted, it was much more difficult to buy for a person who wanted nothing at all, than a person who already had everything. With a person who has everything, you can always count on them to want to _more_.

Becoming increasingly sullen and feeling increasingly stupid with Haruhi standing in front of him and staring at him like that, he decided to go back home. Without another word, he began the long, treacherous three-block walk back toward the house, leaving Haruhi confused and frozen far behind him. For once, he managed to unlock the door without much trouble, and he let himself in to the empty house, feeling worse than he'd felt in ages.

Even if he didn't know how Haruhi he felt about girls or boys, it was precisely clear how she felt about him: she wanted nothing to do with him. He hadn't even received a warm greeting or a smile. Instead he'd gotten bored brown eyes and an annoyed voice asking him why he was there.

The blond could feel the tears well up in his eyes. There was no hope. It didn't even really matter if was a girl or a guy. What was the difference to Haruhi anyway? Either way, she was going to confess to someone tomorrow. The calendar said so. Haruhi had always been a very organized person, and if there was one thing she was good at, it was following through with plans.

Maybe if he'd of realized it sooner, asked her out way back in high school—god, he was such an idiot—there would have been time. Why hadn't anyone told him? No one eve told him anything! Why did everyone force him to waste so much time trying to figure things out on his own?

He sighed in defeat, and began crawling under the bed in hopes that no one would ever find him—that he could be left alone by himself to die and rot away until his body had completely decomposed. It did not cross his mind that he was being melodramatic. Really, it didn't.

Besides, if died under the bed next to the dust-bunnies and dirt, at least then he'd never have to know who Haruhi was going to confess to—who could possibly be so precious to her.

::::

The next morning was a Saturday, and Haruhi went about her daily routine the same way she always had: methodically. It didn't matter that it was Christmas Eve—she still needed a shower, her teeth still needed to be brushed, and someone still had to put the tea kettle on—certain things just couldn't be avoided.

Two and a half hours later, however, and thirty minutes into reading the newspaper, she realized, quite clearly, that something _was_ being avoided: herself. Tamaki was very obviously avoiding her. After she'd returned home after the strange incident that had happened outside of her school, Tamaki had been nowhere to be found. She'd checked all the rooms, and called out his name several times, but the only answers she;d received had been that of her wet shoes squeaking against the linoleum tiles in the kitchen.

At first, it hadn't been anything to worry over. Tamaki needn't always be home, and he need not always cook dinner (or attempt to), and just because he wasn't in the house certainly did not mean that Haruhi felt lonely. Haruhi could be alone. She'd been alone for a long time before Tamaki had come along. Certainly she could do it for one night while Tamaki was over a friend's house or out doing whatever it was he was doing.

Honestly, that was the part that left her feeling like she was missing something.

Where could Tamaki have gone—and on the day before Christmas Eve no less? Last night she'd been tired, but now, eight hours of sleep later with tono still missing, worry was beginning to seep into her skin. Tamaki couldn't possibly be spending the holidays with someone else, could he? Not one to jump to conclusions, she resigned to calling Kyouya when she was finished with the newspaper.

She couldn't wait that long.

Thirteen seconds later she was dialing the Ootori residence with shaking fingers. After two rings, someone picked up.

"Kyouya, I'm sorry to bother you, but—"

"It's fine, it's fine," laughter. Haruhi was relieved to realize that no, Kyouya wasn't laughing, but that it was merely Hikaru who had answered the phone. She let out a little laugh of relief herself.

"Oh, hi Hikaru, I was calling for Kyouya, is he around?"

"Um, he's, uh—actually out at the moment. I could tell him you called if you'd like?" Kyouya wasn't home? He was probably out with Tamaki—obviously—who else would Tamaki have gone out with?

"You haven't—Tamaki's not with him, is he?"

The was brief pause. "Not that I know of, why?" How could Tamaki_ not_ be with Kyouya? Rather steadily, her heart-rate was accelerating.

"It's just—it's nothing. Thanks for the help, I'll talk to you later!" She hung up the phone. Her palms were sweating. Almost immediately, the phone began to ring, and when she glanced down at the caller id, it read "Kyouya." She'd obviously worried Kaoru, but she wasn't sure exactly how to explain to him that she'd lost Tamaki. That she didn't know where he was. That for as much information as she knew, he could have been kidnapped.

"I'm getting ahead of myself," The brunette murmured; a failed attempt to calm herself. It had quite the opposite effect when she realized she was speaking out loud to herself in an empty house. She wrung out her hands and headed towards her bedroom. Perhaps a bit of relaxing was in order.

When her head hit the pillow, Haruhi thought maybe she really did need a break. Between attending school and working part-time, she really had been over-exerting herself lately. A self-instilled sense of perfectionism never seemed to help matters. Her mind drifted easily, consciousness fading, but it seemed like only a few moments later that she was wide awake, hazel eyes trained on the ceiling, ears active.

The sound of the toilet flushing was what woke her up. She nearly had a heart attack. In her sleep-hazy mind, her first thought was that someone had broken in. They were being robbed. She had to get out. Of course, after only a few seconds of hysteria she realized—with some embarrassment—that the noise was probably just Tamaki. Tamaki was home.

With more excitement than she'd liked to admit, Haruhi was running down the hallway, white socks padding across the apartment floor.

Strange.

It was empty. The bathroom was completely, utterly, empty. The water from the toilet was still running, and the sink was still wet, but other than that there wasn't a single sign that anyone had entered the bathroom at all. The shower curtain was blue with yellow ducks, and it hung listlessly; the entire room strangely silent. The white tiling and stack of towels remained untouched. And yet, someone had obviously been in there. She was sure of it.

Haruhi decided to give the rest of the house a once-over, just in case.

The journey to Tamaki's bedroom was a short one, and as she glanced around at the poster-lined walls and cluttered dresser, she realized suddenly how very different she and Tamaki were from one another. Haruhi liked to keep her own room neat and organized—knowing where everything was and having a proper place for them was essential.

Tamaki's room was cluttered with personal items and hair products; silly, sentimental things too, things like movie stubs and old holiday cards that people had sent him. His walls were lined with posters of idols—male and female—tacked up with colorful little thumbtacks or stickers. She kind of liked it—all of it—the clutter, the mess, the lack of organization. It was kind of a relief.

As the glanced around the room, she almost felt like an intruder—although she was sure Tamaki wouldn't have minded her presence. Despite her best intentions, she still felt the urge to snoop, to rifle through drawers and papers in hopes of finding a clue to where had Tamaki had taken off too so near Christmas Eve.

If he wasn't back in time, her holiday plans would be shot to hell.

Her eyes flickered to the right suddenly; a soft rustling noise was coming from somewhere.

Feeling more a little apprehensive, she began to check through the rest of the apartment—which really wasn't much—until she was once again standing in the bathroom doorway. She'd come full circle. The sink was dry and the toilet was silent. Had there ever been any water in the sink at all?

Haruhi felt like she was going crazy. She decided to calm herself with some tea and an attempt to go back to the paper she'd been reading this morning—when, with a surge—she realized it was already mid-evening. It was the windows and not the kitchen clock that had alerted her of the fact. The sky was already dark and bottomless, thin wisps of grey clouds slowly drifting through the star-struck sky. It was already seven. How could it already be seven? Just how long had she slept, exactly?

Dark hair hung in her eyes as she took a seat at the table, hunched her shoulders, and quietly began to cry. It was sudden and strange and frustrating—and foreign too—Haruhi wasn't used to crying.

Here it was, Christmas Eve, and not only had Haruhi not even managed to ask Tamaki out, but now Tamaki wasn't even around to ask out in the first place. _So much for a confession. _

Her eyes clenched shut and her shoulders shook. She sat with tears in her eyes, feeling ridiculously stupid. Tamaki saw her as a daughter, and that was that. She could get used to it. She definitely couldn't get used to no Tamaki at all. As much as she hated to admit it, she felt lost without him. Without his endless enthusiasm and scatter-brained attitude to curve her cynicism and logic, things just didn't feel right. It felt like a precarious balance on a scale had just slipped, sending her heavy heart plummeting.

All of a sudden, Haruhi hated Christmas. She hated everything about it: it's promise for miracles, it's promise for love, and most definitely, she hated it for the day that came before it, and the fact that she was sitting at the kitchen table alone. Feeling stupid, she stood up, dried her eyes, and headed back towards Tamaki's room.

Once inside, she threw herself onto green sheets and stifled a sob. She wasn't going to cry again. It was unnecessary and useless, and it wasn't going to solve anything. The bed smelled like Tamaki, like lavender and cologne. Lavender had been her favorite scent as a child, and her mother had often been prone to scattering it in her pillow-case. It was a relaxing scent; it was supposed to help you fall asleep.

It just made Haruhi want to cry. Breathing in deeply, she attempted to calm herself. Crying really wouldn't solve anything, and even if there wasn't anyone around to hear it, that didn't mean—

There was a noise. A faint, yet nearby noise. Haruhi quieted her breathing, and listened. There most definitely was a noise. Slowly, she removed herself from the bed; eyes alert.

There was somebody in the house.

She tried not to choke on her own fear. It couldn't be Tamaki. Tamaki wasn't the type of person to go sneaking around the house, suspicious and quiet and calculating. Whoever was in the house did not want to be heard. What should she do? Call the police was the most obvious choice, but not a particularly quiet one.

_Hide_. That was what she ought to do, hide. He instincts screamed at her to run. She couldn't just stand there. Flight overcoming fight, she dropped slowly to the floor—the rustling noise becoming louder— and began to move her body beneath the bed.

She screamed.

:::

_to be continued_

:::


	4. Chapter Three

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**Christmas Eve Cakes and Miracles**

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"_Tamaki?_" Haruhi managed breathlessly, all the fear and tension draining from her body.

There underneath the bed—beside empty shoe boxes and old birthday wrapping paper, right next to Haruhi's treasured stuffed bunny from her childhood, just to the left of several of her favorite mechanical pencils, just below a strangely colored pink article of clothing (that appeared to be a skirt, as far as Haruhi could tell), with several candy bar wrappers lying right in front of him—was Tamaki.

Haruhi gaped. She sputtered. Tamaki swallowed.

"He-Hello, Haruhi," he said quietly.

Haruhi stared.

"Are you out of your mind?" She screeched, voice high-pitched with stress and worry. Tamaki didn't answer. A few strands of blond hair fell perfectly onto his face, obstructing indigo blue eyes. Tamaki was at a loss for words. How could he possibly explain himself? Opting for a long, awkward silence rather than speaking with such a high probability of saying something stupid, Tamaki began picking at the orange carpeting; fidgeting and idly twiddling his thumbs.

"Have you been under here this entire time?" Haruhi asked, with a little less edge in her voice. Still, Tamaki could sense her anger, and something else too—but clipped and hurt—and all covered up.

"Uhm, yeah. Sorry." Haruhi breathed in deeply. What could have prompted Tamaki to decide it was best to live under his bed for an entire day? She couldn't even begin to imagine. Tamaki liked to do the silliest and most unthinkable things at times, that Haruhi was beginning to give up on trying to figure them all out.

"Why are my pencils here?" It was all she could ask. She wanted to ask more. She wanted to ask him the more important questions, like why was Usa-chan under his bed, and more importantly, why was he under his bed? But something like that opened so many doors that she wasn't quite sure she ready to walk through.

"I um—I found them here."

"You found them here?" She didn't believe a lick of it, and Tamaki knew it.

"Yeah, I was—uh, looking for them actually! That's what I'm doing under here, in case you were wondering!" Wasn't she wondering? Why hadn't Haruhi asked him where he'd been? Didn't she care about him at all? Hadn't she wondered where'd he'd gone? Missed him, even just the teeniest bit?

Silence enveloped them again. For once, they were on the same exact page. The two of them laid facing each other, a little too close beneath Tamaki's bed, and wondered just _when did things become so awkward?_

Without words and questions to distract him, Tamaki had become distinctly aware of just how close they were. He could nearly feel her body heat. It was really just a few measly inches. Just a few inches! And yet, inches can seem like miles—any distance can seem like forever—if there's something preventing you from closing it.

The longer the silence grew, the more difficult it became for Tamaki to end it—and he so very badly did want to end it. Long, awkward silences were the worst sort of silences, and silences were bad enough as they were. Yet, everything he wanted to say seemed obsolete and useless. There was a strange sort of aura developing between them, Tamaki could tell, and as much as Tamaki wanted to address this, he found the feeling distinctly incommunicable—at least with words.

Haruhi was slowly beginning to figure it out:

There was an elephant in the room.

The longer she stared into Tamaki's eyes—that strange shade of blue-purple—the more apparent it became. There was a very large, very ridiculous, very obnoxious elephant in the room, and it was laying right between them. It became so obvious in that moment that she could nearly see it's smiling face and too-long trunk.

She should ask him, Haruhi thought suddenly. Christmas Eve was tomorrow, and didn't someone famous once say, "there's no time like the present," or something like that? Now really was as good a time as any and all that.

But was it really?

What if the entire thing was fruitless? But then—Tamaki didn't really see her as a daughter, right? Besides, there was that elephant between them too, and as hesitant as Haruhi was to admit it—even to herself—she was certain that elephant was raw feelings, raw, _returned_ feelings. Mutual feelings. She was certain they could both feel it.

Unless she really was going crazy.

Figuring she'd been the boy for four years at Ouran—and that surely, one more night wasn't going to kill her—she took a deep breath, and manned up.

"T-t-tamaki," she stuttered out. So much for manning up. Her words were laden with nervous feelings.

Tamaki looked at her, straight in the eyes, and prayed she wasn't going to come out to him as a lesbian right now. Tamaki really wasn't too sure if he could handle something like that at the moment. His mind was crumbly already.

"I just, um..." Between the two of them, little was getting accomplished. Despite all the raw emotion—just like raw materials—you've got to do something with them. It's only what it is if you just leave it sit there. Raw things—they've got to be turned into other stuff—built upon.

Yet Haruhi and Tamaki—they were terrified of the prospect—of the idea that their perfect little stable would crash before they could hammer the first nail.

"Tamaki, I just—well—will you, I mean, what I'm trying to say, is that..." What was she trying to say, exactly? Even Haruhi wasn't so sure anymore.

"You're not doing anything Christmas Eve, are you?" Haruhi closed her eyes.

(Please say no, please say no, please say no...)

Haruhi couldn't see it through her eyelids (or her fear) but Tamaki's eyes could not have physically widened any further.

"Haruhi!" He screeched suddenly in recognition of the whole fiasco—the elephant, the aura, the calendar, that strange smell from the toaster—he understood all of it. Everything made sense. (Well, maybe not the strange toaster smell.) Haruhi was going to confess to _him_! _To Tamaki!_

He wrapped his arms around her smaller frame and pulled her close; excited.

"Haruhi, Haruhi, Haruhi! Why didn't you just tell Daddy that you wanted to go with him for Christmas Eve?" The words were tumbling out of his mouth without thought; happiness numbing his brain and exuding from his pores.

"This is so great! So, so, so, so, great!" He couldn't have stopped his lips from moving even if he'd wanted to. Haruhi was with him—_his Haruhi_. Haruhi liked Tamaki. Not another boy, not another girl, not some strange American foreigner or a beatnik Yakuza member—Haruhi liked _him_!

She said something against his shirt—the same turtleneck from yesterday (that was embarrassing)—but it was muffled by the fabric and shuffling from Tamaki's constant excited movement. He slowed down and Haruhi pulled her head away from him.

"I said, I'm not your daughter." Tamaki gave her a look.

"I didn't mean daughter like that, silly! I just mean that you—you want to go out with me on Christmas Eve!" Haruhi smiled. She'd known when the word had slipped from his lips that he hadn't meant daughter like that. Tamaki was easy to understand in some ways. The connotation in his voice sometimes revealed everything. When he'd referred to himself as Daddy—it'd been without thought—but his voice, his voice, his voice said the word like _boyfriend_.

"So you'll go then? I, uh, I already booked a place—if that's alright?" Tamaki's smile could have lit up a city.

"Of course it's alright! I'm so glad you're not involved with the Yakuza! This is the greatest! It's the best day ever, and you're here and you look so, so, so, cute!" Tamaki pulled Haruhi against him again, easily and without thought.

Suddenly he gave the action some thought. He gave everything a little bit of thought.

"S-so, does this mean you want to be my girlfriend?" Tamaki asked, his voice rising with his excitement.

"Are you sure you're not the girlfriend, tono?" She asked in jest, chuckling; smiling.

Tamaki's face began filling out with red.

"Of course I'm sure! I'm obviously the boyfriend! I'm a perfect prince and I woo wonderfully and you'll be the perfect, prettiest princess in all the land! Oh Haruhi—think of how great we'll be together! We can go on all sorts of fancy dates—I'll take you anywhere—and we can ride the ferris wheel together at the carnival and go to the movies and take pictures together in those little booths and pick the heart background and print them out on stickers and hand them out to all our friends..."

Tamaki's rambling dissipated into nothingness, and for one solemn moment, they stared at each other. It was neither awkward nor perfect, it merely _was_. It was just one moment, one inconsequential moment in the grand scheme of two lives Simultaneously, their lips parted back in grins to reveal teeth, and Haruhi leaned forward, and kissed him.

It was his turn to falter, his turn to have his cheeks stained red.

Haruhi chuckled again, and rather surprisingly and quickly, it turned into a laugh. At that moment, they seemed to be thinking the same thing: tomorrow was going to be the best Christmas Eve ever.

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end

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